| 3 people marked this as a favorite. |
this is easily solved. just run an AP about the unraveling of prophecy being a central feature. Remember, "Prophecy is always true" in fantasy literature. Pathfinder is a big setting where that's just not the case. Prophecy doesn't work in Golarion.
what happens to prophecy when it doesn't come to pass?
"Perished Auguries" could be a really cool concept AP, with the PCs tracking down pre-Arodenite prophecies, which may yet hold some kernel of truth.
That would be a great idea for an AP. And since APs have not happened unless you run them, it can be presented as "one possible version", or even include several endings/answers and let the GM chose the one they find the coolest. A little like White Wolf did with their big mysteries when they wrote Gehenna for Vampire. That would allow Paizo to (somewhat) keep their cake while we eat it...
|
| 8 people marked this as a favorite. |
I mean, my issue with Aroden mystery wasn't that its going to be unanswered, it was that I get feeling its the biggest most important mystery in the setting and that I should care about it, but I don't. I don't get inspired and get campaign ideas for it.
That's pretty much my take on what some people say about it. 'Here's this really, really super-important setting-defining thing. But we aren't going to tell you anything about it, so it's essentially useless to have even mentioned it at all... Please forget about it. I was never here.'
On the other hand, I love that it already happened, and isn't going to happen while I'm three years into running a campaign set out of a temple of Aroden, with a party that includes a cleric of Aroden, like with those metaplot things that the Time of Troubles (and later, Spellplague) did to end support of elements of AD&D games set in the Forgotten Realms (or pretty much any Vampire, Mage, etc. game set in the World of Darkness, after White Wolf apocalypsed it, and their company, it seems, in the process).
It's become just background setting detail. 'There was once a god of X. He's dead now. His churches have been abandoned or repurposed, your characters family might include former worshippers among the older generation, etc., so you can *make* it relevant to your character or storyline (particularly if you're exploring an old Arodenite chapel or mausoleum or whatever), if you want, or totally ignore it, if you want.'
It's really not much different, to me, than references to the Jistka Imperium or the Tekritanan League (both of which I'm super-more-interested-in than Aroden!), or to pre-Thrune-run Cheliax, or to Osirion onder the rule of the Qadiran satraps, or to Thassilon and it's Runelords.
It's stuff that happened, and was important when it did, but it ended, and is only important to the present-day setting as backstory and *history* that makes the setting feel more like a place were things happen (and have happened in the past) and not a vignette or static snapshot.
In any sort of creative endeavor, there's sometimes a choice not to use *every* color on your palette. To evoke the tone or theme or mood or whatever you want to convey, you might leave out a few colors, or even just use black and white and red, or something. The 'color' that Paizo seems to have left out here is 'prophecy,' which is a common choice in fantasy stories (some classic stories involve children destined to overthrow an evil warlord or whatever).
Other settings have made similar choices, such as to omit the 'color' firearms, feeling that guns don't mesh well with the faux-medieval tone they are going for. It's really an artistic choice, and I respect that, even if some of the 'colors' chosen by any particular setting might not be my favorites, and some of the 'colors' skipped over might be colors I very much would have liked to see.
And that's probably for the best.
If the setting was 100% in accordance to *my* preferences, it would probably not sell nearly as well... :)
| 6 people marked this as a favorite. |
I am a newcomer to Golarion; most of my time with Pathfinder has been spent playing in homebrew campaign worlds that weren't nearly as rich in detail. It wasn't until I started GMing Pathfinder this past year that I looked at Golarion. I was very excited to get the Inner Sea World Guide and get this introduction to the world:
That sentence is how the book starts. It makes it look like Aroden's death is pivotal, today, in forces within the Inner Sea. But now that I find out that Paizo doesn't consider it necessary to reveal the reason he died, I also understand that...
>> Aroden isn't going to turn out to be merely a captive and burst free, ready to kick butt.
>> Invaders from another cosmos, who needed to get Aroden out of the way, aren't going to finally smash into Golarion's cosmos.
>> Gods aren't going to go on dying at the hands of a god-murderer.
>> Divine magic isn't going to go on weakening as gods fall ill in succession, even if older gods are able to survive a divine disease.
>> Cheliax won't devolve into civil war when Iomedae's church discovers that Aroden committed suicide rather than create... what the Church of Thrune created.
I've been waiting, in short, to find out the next chapter in the cosmic saga. It never occurred to me that the death of a GOD could be a McGuffin to set up the world that the devs wanted and then be set off on a shelf, its cosmic work done. But apparently, that's all it is.
Shoddy work, Mr. Jacobs.
The death of a god should have on-going consequences. Consequences that we GMs need to be let in on. At least in a "GM-only blog." (Sure, some players will read it. If it fires up their imaginations to run a campaign of their own, all the better!) But we need a head's-up as to what will be headed Golarion's way from whatever it was that could kill a god or make him want to kill himself.
And we deserve it, too. We GMs put flesh and blood on the skeleton that devs like Adam Daigle put together. We make Golarion breathe. Without us, there'd be no Golarion in front of players. Never mind that Paizo would make no money, their fiction wouldn't actually take shape. (Like a playwright who writes a script that never sees a stage.)
Finding out (a) that there is an answer, and (b) that the devs are let in on it, and (c) that the GMs aren't "worthy" to ever find out... is a slap in our face. At least, to answer the Q in this thread: I feel both disappointed and slapped.
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
And how much would you pay for the answer.
What will you do once you have the answer.
What other mystery will you wonder about.
How disappointed will you be if it isn't what you thought it would be.
How much will you pay for the answer.
I see people say they're owed answers, or it's insulting to them, or they'll get best up if they do it wrong, or someone from Paizo is slapping them, but I haven't heard anyone say how much they're willing to fork over or whatever will keep them around after it's revealed.
| 5 people marked this as a favorite. |
If they make the answer part of an AP, I'd be paying $120 for it (or at minimum, $20 for the book it came from).
If it's just part of a campaign setting book, somewhere between $10 and $20.
That's up to them, not me.
As for what will keep me around? Same things that are now. Somehow I don't think Paizo believes the Aroden mystery is the only thing keeping some people playing. If they do, that's really sad. It shows a lack of faith in the quality of their product.
20 dollars isn't much.
Mostly i want to steer the conversation away from how you feel wronged by the answer not being revealed to how it being revealed would make you feel and once it's revealed, what would keep you coming back.
Creative Director
|
| 14 people marked this as a favorite. |
I'm sorry some folks are disappointed or frustrated by our decision to keep Aroden's death a mystery.
If this one mystery is ruining the setting for you, then maybe you should consider telling other stories in Golarion that focus on topics other than Aroden. That's pretty much what we've done with the setting—Aroden's death set up the current era, but we aren't interested in telling stories about Aroden's death. That's why we had that event occur a century BEFORE the current in-game year. We are more interested in telling other stories in a world that, 100 years ago, had a significant change take place.
If not knowing how Aroden died is that big a deal, then maybe Golarion isn't the setting for you. That's fine. Not everyone has to like every thing.
| 7 people marked this as a favorite. |
I'm sorry some folks are disappointed or frustrated by our decision to keep Aroden's death a mystery.
If this one mystery is ruining the setting for you, then maybe you should consider telling other stories in Golarion that focus on topics other than Aroden. That's pretty much what we've done with the setting—Aroden's death set up the current era, but we aren't interested in telling stories about Aroden's death. That's why we had that event occur a century BEFORE the current in-game year. We are more interested in telling other stories in a world that, 100 years ago, had a significant change take place.
If not knowing how Aroden died is that big a deal, then maybe Golarion isn't the setting for you. That's fine. Not everyone has to like every thing.
I would like to say that, despite my expressed disappointment with this element of the setting, I actually often really like the setting. A lot.
In the same way that I didn't like the lack of information in Eberron, but find it still one of my favorite published settings, this is a mystery that I don't care for (at least as a "never going to be revealed" thing), but I find the setting, as a whole, to be solid, well-made, and well-thought-out. I enjoy Golarion, its history, and people, and ideas, and designs. I think that you and the others have done a good job of it, and, although I expressed a negative attitude at one point (and expressed that about how several things interact), I don't want to give the impression that the over-all work is poorly made or unilaterally rejected.
The APs do help the world come alive. Similarly, I enjoy many of the Core deities, and much of the world-building. I like the Iconics (both as an art form and in writing), and I enjoy a lot of the elements.
Instead, I wish to emphasize that I am expressing this about one aspect of the setting, not the whole (though it's at least partially related to a few others).
Also, it should be worth noting that I do feel free to diverge from the setting in certain regards, either with home brew or with elements that don't exist or are changed from how originally presented - but I like doing so "on purpose" rather than "by accident" - when I do so on purpose, it feels like I make it mine. It's a willful decision, in other words.
But I also wish to emphasize how much respect I give to what both you and Adam said here - and I recognize the value in what you do, and how it differs from my own preferences. As Set noted, if everything was done to my every little preference, it probably wouldn't sell nearly as well, and obviously you guys are getting new customers, so... that's awesome! And just as obviously, older customers enjoy it, which is also awesome!
Either way, thank you for the setting, as you've made it, individually, and collectively.
| 3 people marked this as a favorite. |
Oh! And also: thank you for responding and not being burned. I know we can be loud and passionate nerds, here, but we (or at least, I) always appreciate input from you guys! :D
| 4 people marked this as a favorite. |
20 dollars isn't much.
Mostly i want to steer the conversation away from how you feel wronged by the answer not being revealed to how it being revealed would make you feel and once it's revealed, what would keep you coming back.
I don't feel wronged. However, it sounds like you're following a similar thought process that Adam referenced above - kind of the idea that it's a big thing now but, if we knew the answer, it would lose it's specialness (is that right?)
I can understand that position if 'unsolved mysteries' are the things you want from a campaign setting, but that actually isn't of much value to me. Rightly or wrongly, I don't like to unknowingly deviate from canon. Once I know how things are supposed to work, I'm happy to rewrite or ignore/add stuff, but I don't want to mess with something which may have downstream consequences without knowing about it. So the way I use campaign sourcebooks Aroden's mystery (and all its offshoots like the Eye of Abendego and the Worldwound) are no-go areas. At least until there's something official like WotR or similar.
In terms of how much would you pay I haven't really thought about it. Pretty sure I'd pay considerably more than Paizo would ever consider charging for it though. However, I don't think the money has factored into their thinking on this issue at all - I think it's a creative choice (and like their other choices, one they've put a lot of thought into, so I completely respect it, even whilst wishing they'd gone a different way).
| 4 people marked this as a favorite. |
And "ditto" to basically everything tacticslion just said.
| 4 people marked this as a favorite. |
Aroden's death is quite interesting. The idea that his demise somehow "broke" prophecy, that everyone was geared up for his return,and then... oops?
You're assuming that Aroden's death "broke" prophecy. It COULD be the other way around.
|
| 3 people marked this as a favorite. |
For the record, across 40+ people for whom I ran games set in Golarion, the amount of people who were interested in the MoAD (Mystery of Aroden's Death) was exactly:
1
And that number is the one turbo-setting-passionate-I-read-more-of-the-Wiki-than-the-GM-did player who's applying his OCD desire to know everything about the setting to every RPG he plays. Try running Paranoia or any other game where the setting is vague, he goes bonkers.
Sometimes I think this board is mostly populated by his clones and the Real People That You Actually Game With don't give a damn about such minutiae of the setting. From my experience, people want to know the most immediate stuff which affects their PCs and the adventure at hand. Perhaps some day somebody will roll an Arodenite PC and then the MoAD will feature ... but for now, nobody seems to be after it.
Oh, and Aro is LN, which is a non-starter for 80% of my players, who hover around CN and CG.
| 3 people marked this as a favorite. |
A mystery, like any story, is as strong as your emotional investment in it. I added Aroden stuff to my first years-long Pathfinder game. Ironically, the real investment my players had was with some servants/allies of Pharasma, who they were allied with, and some villains, all of whom I designed. It didn't really feel like an Aroden story until the end, but that's alright.
Like James said, the Aroden mystery is probably not the right story for some. I am in favor of this particular mystery being solved. Partially because we know there is an answer, and partially because hints continue to be dropped here and there, so it's like a bread crumb trail that just loops back on itself. Hansel and Gretel remain lost in the woods forever.
But ultimately, even though setting books hyped it up a lot, it doesn't have much impact on campaigns. At least the published APs I've read (note: haven't read all of them). Even the elves, dwarves, gnomes, and other critters that lived through Aroden's death don't bring it up and it isn't noted in their backstories. My Mummy's Mask game is about mummy stuff and that's awesome and doesn't need any non-mummy mysteries to be solved.
I think the disconnect some are having (including me, depending on my mood) is that the event should have great importance if only because of how much Paizo emphasized it in early books. But in practice, this one dead god only comes up in play as often as the gods that died protecting Golarion from the Starstone (Acavna, Amaznen). Lost/forgotten deities come up multiple times (peacock spirit, Lissala) and most definitely can have an active impact in play. But Paizo making Aroden have real impacts on published adventures would likely just make more people request the solution to the mystery, so it's a catch-22.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
For the record, across 40+ people for whom I ran games set in Golarion, the amount of people who were interested in the MoAD (Mystery of Aroden's Death) was exactly:
1
And that number is the one turbo-setting-passionate-I-read-more-of-the-Wiki-than-the-GM-did player who's applying his OCD desire to know everything about the setting to every RPG he plays. Try running Paranoia or any other game where the setting is vague, he goes bonkers.
Sometimes I think this board is mostly populated by his clones and the Real People That You Actually Game With don't give a damn about such minutiae of the setting. From my experience, people want to know the most immediate stuff which affects their PCs and the adventure at hand. Perhaps some day somebody will roll an Arodenite PC and then the MoAD will feature ... but for now, nobody seems to be after it.
Oh, and Aro is LN, which is a non-starter for 80% of my players, who hover around CN and CG.
My players aren't interested in it either, but I suspect that's because I downplay it. How much focus do you give it as DM?
|
Creative Director
|
| 3 people marked this as a favorite. |
Oh! And also: thank you for responding and not being burned. I know we can be loud and passionate nerds, here, but we (or at least, I) always appreciate input from you guys! :D
Thanks. Of course, the fact that I responded should not be taken as evidence that I wasn't burned. I felt that the thread needed a response and did my best to keep personal feelings out of it.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
20 dollars isn't much.
And 0 dollars is even less, just sayin'.
Mostly i want to steer the conversation away from how you feel wronged by the answer not being revealed to how it being revealed would make you feel and once it's revealed, what would keep you coming back.
I feel like the setting would have more story potential with an answer than without. If Cheliax were just a vague footnote in the history of Golarion, I doubt many people would want to run a game there, or play characters from there. Because of the detail it has, people are more interested in it, not less.
Imagine if the Aroden mystery were known and the Cheliax mystery not. Would you say, then, that if the Cheliax mystery were revealed in a campaign setting book, nobody would be interested in the setting after a while?
I don't think the logic follows, basically. I'm sure the number of people hooked on this setting because Aroden's disappearance is vague and unsolved is non-zero, but I doubt it's actually that significant of a number.
| 12 people marked this as a favorite. |
I like the mystery, though practically speaking, I think that Paizo's unwillingness to explore it is probably just gonna lead to nobody exploring it. Most people don't build campaigns based on Golarion lore without an AP pushing them into it, after all.
I do think that the "We know the secret, but nobody else does, and we'll never reveal it, so there," attitude from Paizo sort of rings of insecurity. As I've said elsewhere, if you don't put it down on paper, it's not canon—just a theory. Death of the Author, guys. Death of the Author is what has enabled millions of wonderful fan theories about everything from Portal to Lord of the Rings to The Great Gatsby, and when an author shows this sort of "Nuh-uh" attitude towards theories, it hurts that sense of real mystery.
Keith Baker understood how this works. I really respected and admired his take in the Last Issue of Dragon: "What caused the Day of Mourning? I hope we never find out. I have my theories, and you have yours." It made the setting feel more fluid, more flexible. James Jacobs's insistence that his answer is Right and Official makes it a lot less fun to speculate. Paizo could learn a lot from Baker's attitude toward secrets—there is no "right" answer. We each have our own explanation for the Day of Mourning, and I've both seen and played in games where GMs explored just that, because they felt free to do so.
This is why J.K. Rowling's "Oh, yeah, Dumbledore is retroactively gay" declaration isn't real representation, by the way. It's just an author's interpretation. It's also why we can ignore parts of the Star Wars universe that we think are dumb, like the prequels, or the Force-sensitive droid. It's why I'm able to pretend Buffy the Vampire Slayer ended after the fifth season. It's why we ignore Ray Bradbury's idiotic "damn newfangled televisions is ruining books" interpretation of Fahrenheit 451 (seriously, he thinks that's the moral his story about book burning gets across).
Paizo's theory is likely very sound and very well-crafted, since they built the whole setting around it. But until they either put enough clues into their setting to make it guessable (as Alex Hirsch, creator of Gravity Falls, would recommend—why bother with an unsolvable mystery?) or just outright reveal it, it will never be canon. They would do well to accept that.
For my part, like I said, I really like the mystery. I enjoy my interpretations, both cribbed from other posters: One, that Aroden and Pharasma arranged for his death (and the death of prophecy) to avert some future calamity that was prophesied, and two, that Aroden was Norgorber all along.
|
I am a newcomer to Golarion; most of my time with Pathfinder has been spent playing in homebrew campaign worlds that weren't nearly as rich in detail. It wasn't until I started GMing Pathfinder this past year that I looked at Golarion. I was very excited to get the Inner Sea World Guide and get this introduction to the world:
That sentence is how the book starts. It makes it look like Aroden's death is pivotal, today, in forces within the Inner Sea. But now that I find out that Paizo doesn't consider it necessary to reveal the reason he died, I also understand that...
>> Aroden isn't going to turn out to be merely a captive and burst free, ready to kick butt.
>> Invaders from another cosmos, who needed to get Aroden out of the way, aren't going to finally smash into Golarion's cosmos.
>> Gods aren't going to go on dying at the hands of a god-murderer.
>> Divine magic isn't going to go on weakening as gods fall ill in succession, even if older gods are able to survive a divine disease.
>> Cheliax won't devolve into civil war when Iomedae's church discovers that Aroden committed suicide rather than create... what the Church of Thrune created.I've been waiting, in short, to find out the next chapter in the cosmic saga. It never occurred to me that the death of a GOD could be a McGuffin to set up the world that the devs wanted and then be set off on a shelf, its cosmic work done. But apparently, that's all it is.
Shoddy work, Mr. Jacobs.
The death of a god should have on-going consequences. Consequences that we GMs need to be let in on. At least in a "GM-only blog." (Sure, some players will read it. If it fires up their imaginations to run a campaign of their own, all the better!) But we need a head's-up as to what will be headed Golarion's way from whatever it was that could kill a god or make him want to kill himself.
And we deserve it, too. We GMs put flesh and...
umm... Aroden's death is important. Prophecy is gone, swept away, gone awry.
So... the future is up to you - the players. No chicken-bone inscribed by a half-mad prophet a thousand years ago, foretelling that XXX will do YYY and be defeated by ZZZ is going to lay out the story. None of that stuff works anymore.
So, there's a mechanical and thematic element to Golarion which makes Aroden's death, even unexplored in a game, directly relevant.
Beyond this, there are a lot of plot hooks for those interested in playing a game exploring them - there's a god-murderer out there, or something that killed him, or a god-disease, or Tar Baphon did XXX and hoo boy, someone's gotta stop him before he does it again!
|
|
| 3 people marked this as a favorite. |
My players aren't interested in it either, but I suspect that's because I downplay it. How much focus do you give it as DM?For the record, across 40+ people for whom I ran games set in Golarion, the amount of people who were interested in the MoAD (Mystery of Aroden's Death) was exactly:
1
And that number is the one turbo-setting-passionate-I-read-more-of-the-Wiki-than-the-GM-did player who's applying his OCD desire to know everything about the setting to every RPG he plays. Try running Paranoia or any other game where the setting is vague, he goes bonkers.
Sometimes I think this board is mostly populated by his clones and the Real People That You Actually Game With don't give a damn about such minutiae of the setting. From my experience, people want to know the most immediate stuff which affects their PCs and the adventure at hand. Perhaps some day somebody will roll an Arodenite PC and then the MoAD will feature ... but for now, nobody seems to be after it.
Oh, and Aro is LN, which is a non-starter for 80% of my players, who hover around CN and CG.
Me: There used to be Aroden, the LN God of Humanity, who died under mysterious circumstances 100 years ago and his death is linked to Cheliax going to hell in a hand-basket, the Eye of Abendego appearing and cats and dogs living together. Some of his portfolio was picked up by successor gods such as Milani or Iomedae. Also, because his return was a major prophecy that kind of blew up when he kicket the bucket, we're now in the Age of Lost Omens which means my vague and infuriating answers to divination spells are going to be, uh, even more vague and infuriating. Any questions?
Players: Yes, do you have more of those honey and chilli peanuts?
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
And how much would you pay for the answer.
What will you do once you have the answer.
What other mystery will you wonder about.
How disappointed will you be if it isn't what you thought it would be.
How much will you pay for the answer.
I see people say they're owed answers, or it's insulting to them, or they'll get best up if they do it wrong, or someone from Paizo is slapping them, but I haven't heard anyone say how much they're willing to fork over or whatever will keep them around after it's revealed.
I do hope you know that "none of you damn business" is a perfectly valid, and in fact perhaps the most appropriate, answer to all of your questions.
It's exactly this kind of patronizing attitude that irritates me about the whole thing. I can respect the decision to keep a mystery permanent. Onyx Path Publishing did this with their God-Machine setting, mostly to keep the "lost knowledge/conspiracy/everyone lies" theme they built the entire setting around, and I like it. Tolkien never explained who or what Tom Bombadil or the Watcher in the Water were (mostly because he probably didn't know himself), and I LOVE that.
My problem is that, as far as we know, the reason, or a big part of the reason why this knowledge is retained is because of the risk that people will lose interest once it's revealed. (Which is, incidentally, factually incorrect. The Starstone reveal made me more interest on it than I was before. Before it was a giant Dragon Ball for all that I cared. Now it has history and dramatic weight.)
"There, there, little child. The adult knows better."
I mean, "What other mystery will you wonder about"? I'm sorry, I do believe that is my problem.
I don't want to come across as too aggressive here, I jsut want to make very clear where the problem lies, for me.
| 7 people marked this as a favorite. |
I think one of the problems with Aroden as a "pivotal" figure is that Golarion's key motif—as Eberron's is "magitek post-WWI social commentary" and Ravenloft's is "gothic horror" and Forgotten Realms's is, I don't know, "elves!"—has become "kitchen sink". I no longer know where the real core story elements of Golarion fit in. Is Golarion a decadent, decaying world where prophecy is dead and old empires have turned to diabolism? Is that "core" Golarion, when you strip all the spaceships and Ustalavs and romanticized imperialism away? How does the Pathfinder Society fit into that?
Basically, I think there's so much going on that Aroden tends to be forgotten. I actually think the key misstep was in saying, "There are almost no churches to Aroden anymore." That minimized his presence unnecessarily. It made it easy to forget about him. Paizo should have left those churches around, sad collections of clerics and mystics who pray to Iomedae only technically—or maybe pray to no one at all, and just get no spells.
Paizo should really play up the "lost god" more if they want people to care about the mystery. Do an AP about broken prophecies! Do an adventure about an Aroden imposter! And so on.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
My players aren't interested in it either, but I suspect that's because I downplay it. How much focus do you give it as DM?For the record, across 40+ people for whom I ran games set in Golarion, the amount of people who were interested in the MoAD (Mystery of Aroden's Death) was exactly:
1
And that number is the one turbo-setting-passionate-I-read-more-of-the-Wiki-than-the-GM-did player who's applying his OCD desire to know everything about the setting to every RPG he plays. Try running Paranoia or any other game where the setting is vague, he goes bonkers.
Sometimes I think this board is mostly populated by his clones and the Real People That You Actually Game With don't give a damn about such minutiae of the setting. From my experience, people want to know the most immediate stuff which affects their PCs and the adventure at hand. Perhaps some day somebody will roll an Arodenite PC and then the MoAD will feature ... but for now, nobody seems to be after it.
Oh, and Aro is LN, which is a non-starter for 80% of my players, who hover around CN and CG.
Me: There used to be Aroden, the LN God of Humanity, who died under mysterious circumstances 100 years ago and his death is linked to Cheliax going to hell in a hand-basket, the Eye of Abendego appearing and cats and dogs living together. Some of his portfolio was picked up by successor gods such as Milani or Iomedae. Also, because his return was a major prophecy that kind of blew up when he kicket the bucket, we're now in the Age of Lost Omens which means my vague and infuriating answers to divination spells are going to be, uh, even more vague and infuriating. Any questions?
Players: Yes, do you have more of those honey and chilli peanuts?
Chilli and honey are pretty good.
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
Aroden's death set up the current era, but we aren't interested in telling stories about Aroden's death. That's why we had that event occur a century BEFORE the current in-game year. We are more interested in telling other stories in a world that, 100 years ago, had a significant change take place.This makes the Gap's centuries of distance from Starfinder's starting point even more curious. Will it have similar distance from the official setting's storytelling?
You know, the funny thing is that the Gap doesn't bother me at all and never will. The reasons are quite clear: If Golarion's "past" was accessible through Pathfinder it would "crystallize" future development (unless Paizo decided to mess around with alternate universes). The fact that it doesn't come across¹ as arbitrary makes me at ease.
¹ I just want to underline that I'm not saying keeping Aroden's death under wraps is arbitrary, just that it feels so. It's about perception, not a moral judgement on the people at Paizo.
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
umm... Aroden's death is important. Prophecy is gone, swept away, gone awry.
So... the future is up to you - the players. No chicken-bone inscribed by a half-mad prophet a thousand years ago, foretelling that XXX will do YYY and be defeated by ZZZ is going to lay out the story. None of that stuff works anymore.
So, there's a mechanical and thematic element to Golarion which makes Aroden's death, even unexplored in a game, directly relevant.
It's NOT directly relevant, though. Or even indirectly relevant. It's a meta plot at best.
In ANY RPG the players and their characters determine the future. Even with prophecies you have the freedom of choice to do whatever you want. Usually you, the player, is going to buy into the plot hook...but that's the same as Golarion. If the players don't bite the hook, there is no plot. Prophecy or no, that's how it works.
The death of prophecy just removes an old, and arguably overdone trope that serves as a plot hook. This is not a fundamental change to the game in the day to day, or even really in an over-arching plot. It barely changes the setting since by the time you're on the scene people are used to it.
Maybe if spells like Augury and Divination simply didn't exist any more that would be interesting. The whole Divination school basically obliterated, what little there is left (like Detect Magic) rolled into other schools. Kinda what Skyrim did with the Mysticism school of magic in the Elder Scrolls.
I'd love to see that. THAT has a direct effect on gameplay. But alas, backwards compatibility strikes again.
| 3 people marked this as a favorite. |
Golarion still has prophecy. The Harrow deck is more than many settings have, too.
|
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
how it being revealed would make you feel and once it's revealed, what would keep you coming back.
First question depends a bit on how it is revealed. I would hope that it would be revealed via an AP (or even better, over the course of several APs) and in this case it would make me feel great, because that's what I was hoping for the whole time when starting the Pathfinder endeavor).
I guess the second question is harder to answer. Because I just realized that revealing this mystery might necessitate moving the setting forward in time, and that is another thing the Paizo officials said they don't want to do (another decision I'm a bit sad about).
But generally I think that the answer to this mystery might have repercussions for parts of the setting that are equally worth exploring. How will the reveal of this answer impact Cheliax, for example.
I also agree with what KC said about playing up this topic more. I mean, Starfinder has also this big mystery at hand, and I can only assume that we won't never get the answer to how and why Golarion vanished. But part of the setting seems to be that players go on missions to actually try and find out what happened. Contrary to Pathfinder where nobody seems to care the least bit about Aroden anymore.
But well, it is as it is, and I have fun enough with the APs we actually get, so it's certainly not a dealbreaker for me. Or well, maybe it is, but if I use the APs in another setting, Paizo is still getting the same amount of money from me, and I guess we all can live with that. ;)
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Razmir would make a good Aroden 2.0. Imagine a false god getting so many followers he ascended.
And if prophecy doesn't work on Golarian, why not put all the seers on Triaxus(spelling may be off) so they can tell prophecies about their home planet there? Side effect of the 'mystery' avoided.
Golarion still has prophecy. The Harrow deck is more than many settings have, too.
Golarion has divination, but not prophecy. With the harrow deck, you have folks faking it, and folks making fairly strong guesses based on magic's prediction of the future (like augery, divination, etc.). Prophecy is, "On the third day of 4785, a plague of demons will scour the land, destroying all in their path. Only a boy born that same day with golden eyes will be able to stop them." That's two parts and if prophecies are correct, both will happen exactly as described. In Golarion, you might get something like that from a divination spell or a chit chat with the gods, but maybe the date is wrong. Maybe just knowing it causes something else to happen. Maybe the hero has silver eyes and is 600 years old. Maybe you can stop the demons from coming. That's what they mean by prophecy being broken. You can't make that firm a prediction and know for sure it will happen.
...when an author shows this sort of "Nuh-uh" attitude towards theories, it hurts that sense of real mystery.
Maybe I missed it, but I don't recall seeing anyone from Paizo shooting down theories. The situation seems complex enough that it's unlikely someone solved the mystery exactly, but there used to be a ton of theories about Aroden's demise years ago and I bet someone came pretty close. It's most important that your theory works for you.
| 3 people marked this as a favorite. |
umm... Aroden's death is important. Prophecy is gone, swept away, gone awry.
So... the future is up to you - the players. No chicken-bone inscribed by a half-mad prophet a thousand years ago, foretelling that XXX will do YYY and be defeated by ZZZ is going to lay out the story. None of that stuff works anymore.
So, there's a mechanical and thematic element to Golarion which makes Aroden's death, even unexplored in a game, directly relevant.
It's NOT directly relevant, though. Or even indirectly relevant. It's a meta plot at best. [...]
Maybe if spells like Augury and Divination simply didn't exist any more that would be interesting. The whole Divination school basically obliterated, what little there is left (like Detect Magic) rolled into other schools. Kinda what Skyrim did with the Mysticism school of magic in the Elder Scrolls.
I'd love to see that. THAT has a direct effect on gameplay. But alas, backwards compatibility strikes again.
You know, I never even picked up on the idea that divination wasn't supposed to work. That diviners at Aroden's death went mad, yes. That divine prophecy isn't so popular any more, yes.
But if the setting book had told me that Divination spells fail x% of the time... that would have gotten my attention.
If Harrow decks had been noted as decadent art now used only for gambling... that would have gotten my attention. Better yet: if the instructions for using them had said to lay out three columns, but to turn over only the first two, since the third one had become errant nonsense after the death of Aroden.
No, the death of Aroden hasn't even become a Thing for the death of prophecy. Necessarily, anyway -- maybe it is for your campaign, and that's great. But readings from a Harrow deck have been actively shaping mine, something I've enjoyed as I've watched it happen. As has been encouraged, RAW.
| 11 people marked this as a favorite. |
My thoughts on Aroden's mystery is that there was a two year period where I literally forgot Aroden existed in the lore. And when I rediscovered him basically nothing changed in how I handled or perceived things.
And it seems kind of weird and sad and paradoxical that this one character can simultaneously be so important and so pivotal to the history of Golarion and yet also be completely irrelevant at the same time.
James said maybe Golarion's not for us if we have a problem with it... but I feel like that's a dramatic overstatement, because Aroden and his mystery is so unimportant it basically doesn't even factor into whether or not I like Golarion.
It's a mystery with no intrigue and no substance and really just, no reason to care at all other than that people within the setting might care about it.
So every few months I see something like this and go "Oh, there's some lore that we'll never get to see, that's a shame" and then put the idea on the shelf and be done with it again.
I guess ultimately my answer to the question in the topic is 'meh'.
| 3 people marked this as a favorite. |
James Jacobs has openly stated that Paizo "knows" the "true" answer, but will never share it, and that it's not guessable.
Also, while the Harrow deck doesn't give big wordy prophecies, it has been known to grant accurate foretellings. See Curse of the Crimson Throne for an example. My point is that that is still more "prophecy" than a lot of fantasy settings feature. We're just told that it's basically less than it used to be.
| 5 people marked this as a favorite. |
Look at it this way: Just as I don't remember a time before 9/11, players in Golarion, and their PCs, don't remember a time when prophecy worked "like it used to". They just see Harrow decks giving semi-accurate predictions and going, "Oh, cool, there's these prophetic card decks." The fact that it is less than it used to be is entirely academic, and doesn't shape much of anything.
You know, I never even picked up on the idea that divination wasn't supposed to work. That diviners at Aroden's death went mad, yes. That divine prophecy isn't so popular any more, yes.But if the setting book had told me that Divination spells fail x% of the time... that would have gotten my attention.
If Harrow decks had been noted as decadent art now used only for gambling... that would have gotten my attention. Better yet: if the instructions for using them had said to lay out three columns, but to turn over only the first two, since the third one had become errant nonsense after the death of Aroden.
No, the death of Aroden hasn't even become a Thing for the death of prophecy. Necessarily, anyway -- maybe it is for your campaign, and that's great. But readings from a Harrow deck have been actively shaping mine, something I've enjoyed as I've watched it happen. As has been encouraged, RAW.
TBF, Divination and the like DO have a failure chance, they only ever have, at most, a 90% chance of working (70% + 1% per CL) without items and whatnot.
That's just not any different than 3.5's version, so it's not really a result of anything about Aroden.
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
I'm sorry some folks are disappointed or frustrated by our decision to keep Aroden's death a mystery.
If this one mystery is ruining the setting for you, then maybe you should consider telling other stories in Golarion that focus on topics other than Aroden. That's pretty much what we've done with the setting—Aroden's death set up the current era, but we aren't interested in telling stories about Aroden's death. That's why we had that event occur a century BEFORE the current in-game year. We are more interested in telling other stories in a world that, 100 years ago, had a significant change take place.
If not knowing how Aroden died is that big a deal, then maybe Golarion isn't the setting for you. That's fine. Not everyone has to like every thing.
This one mystery isn't ruining anything for me.
But I'm disappointed to find out that a force I had assumed to be working actively backstage, shaping the world after it KILLED A GOD or caused one to die, isn't there. Just isn't there anymore. It seems so... petty not to tell us what it was, a century ago. If you know, why hold the cookie plate out of reach, and tell us to eat our spinach?
It would be worse if that force is there, is working, but in an unwritten way. A way that I could inadvertently ignore and actually work against as I shape Golarion for my players. Then you're withholding the spinach!
I'll move on after reading this thread. I'll still be enthusiastic about the majority of your work, Mr. Jacobs. I will. But right now, I'm feeling disappointed and slapped.
|
|
You know, I never even picked up on the idea that divination wasn't supposed to work. That diviners at Aroden's death went mad, yes. That divine prophecy isn't so popular any more, yes.But if the setting book had told me that Divination spells fail x% of the time... that would have gotten my attention.
If Harrow decks had been noted as decadent art now used only for gambling... that would have gotten my attention. Better yet: if the instructions for using them had said to lay out three columns, but to turn over only the first two, since the third one had become errant nonsense after the death of Aroden.
No, the death of Aroden hasn't even become a Thing for the death of prophecy. Necessarily, anyway -- maybe it is for your campaign, and that's great. But readings from a Harrow deck have been actively shaping mine, something I've enjoyed as I've watched it happen. As has been encouraged, RAW.
TBF, Divination and the like DO have a failure chance, they only ever have, at most, a 90% chance of working (70% + 1% per CL) without items and whatnot.
That's just not any different than 3.5's version, so it's not really a result of anything about Aroden.
I want to say the whole "prophecy is broken" thing is the in-Golarion reason for those spells having those failures chances, but I'm probably wrong.
|
|
| 4 people marked this as a favorite. |
James Jacobs has openly stated that Paizo "knows" the "true" answer, but will never share it, and that it's not guessable.
And thats the part I think they misshandled. You have an answer to a mystery your never going to reveal thats fine but dont tell everyone you have the answer and are never going to tell them it.
Look at it this way: Just as I don't remember a time before 9/11, players in Golarion, and their PCs, don't remember a time when prophecy worked "like it used to". They just see Harrow decks giving semi-accurate predictions and going, "Oh, cool, there's these prophetic card decks." The fact that it is less than it used to be is entirely academic, and doesn't shape much of anything.
You don't remember a time before 9/11? And you're an active gamer shaping this forum? I feel soooooo old.
The thing is, while my PCs don't remember Aroden's death, one of my major NPCs does. Or ought to. (I'm talking about Shalelu in Jade Regent, who is written as 130 years old. But I had to bump her age up because the AP allows a "younger sibling" as a starting PC. Since an elven PC has to start at at least age 116, but Shalelu as written has a lot of levels...) I don't have material to use for her, though. And the PC should have grown up with adults who sighed about such things, and the player doesn't even know who Aroden is because I haven't been able to make this BIG BIG BIG part of the setting vivid for her.
I really wish Paizo was willing to explore his death more. I really do. It's frustrating that it's {as I now know} just an airy explanation for all the weirdness in the setting.
| 4 people marked this as a favorite. |
... You can know a great deal about who Aroden was without knowing how he died.
I mean, I could tell you stories about my maternal grandfather all the live-long day and what he means to me, and I don't have an exact diagnosis of what killed him.
"He was supposed to return. Instead, we got cosmic upheaval and bad mojo. No one seems to know why."
You know, I never even picked up on the idea that divination wasn't supposed to work. That diviners at Aroden's death went mad, yes. That divine prophecy isn't so popular any more, yes.But if the setting book had told me that Divination spells fail x% of the time... that would have gotten my attention.
If Harrow decks had been noted as decadent art now used only for gambling... that would have gotten my attention. Better yet: if the instructions for using them had said to lay out three columns, but to turn over only the first two, since the third one had become errant nonsense after the death of Aroden.
No, the death of Aroden hasn't even become a Thing for the death of prophecy. Necessarily, anyway -- maybe it is for your campaign, and that's great. But readings from a Harrow deck have been actively shaping mine, something I've enjoyed as I've watched it happen. As has been encouraged, RAW.
The way I look at it, there's prophecy and there's PROPHECY. The former is predicting who will win the football game an hour before play time, the latter is predicting who will win the SuperBowl three years in advance. The former is akin to what divination spells and Harrow readings do. The latter is special gift stuff that drives whole settings - like Aroden showing up in Westcrown after not being directly involved on Golarion for a long time to signify the return of humanity to its historic dominance.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
And thats the part I think they misshandled. You have an answer to a mystery your never going to reveal thats fine but dont tell everyone you have the answer and are never going to tell them it.James Jacobs has openly stated that Paizo "knows" the "true" answer, but will never share it, and that it's not guessable.
Precisely my point. Every setting needs unsolved mysteries. Bombadil and the entwives. The true nature of the Dark Powers. The Day of Mourning and the Draconic Prophecy, the true virtue of the Silver Flame, and whether or not the gods of Eberron are real. Why Roque Ja let Thorn and Bone go. Why we give a s!+* about any quests when Elminster could just fix everything because he's so great and perfect and badass omg Elminster plz answer my calls. Mysteries are a crucial part of fantasy, and Paizo is fully entitled to its own. The trouble is, they don't seem to get the point of one.
You don't remember a time before 9/11? And you're an active gamer shaping this forum? I feel soooooo old.
I also don't remember a time before Toy Story.
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
And thats the part I think they misshandled. You have an answer to a mystery your never going to reveal thats fine but dont tell everyone you have the answer and are never going to tell them it.James Jacobs has openly stated that Paizo "knows" the "true" answer, but will never share it, and that it's not guessable.
I think that depends on your psychology. To me, that's them telling me "Here are the keys. It's yours now. You decide how Aroden died for your Golarion."
But then, my other favorite campaign setting is Greyhawk, another campaign setting that sketches in a lot of framework but leaves a lot of definition up to the GM.
Which makes it an enormous pain in the ass to make a character for if you've never played in it. Answering a simple question like "Where am I from?" is like pulling teeth in that setting.
Great setting, loving Age of Worms, but more information easily available would be great.
More to the point it also doesn't have the writers coming in to tease you "I know the answer and you never wiii-iilll".
| 4 people marked this as a favorite. |
I think you misunderstood both me and Kevin Mack, Bill Dunn. We're fine with unclarified mysteries. The problem is that Paizo is determined to have the One True Answer. It's actually not that big a problem, but it indicates a fundamental failure to understand what makes a great uncertainty.
We aren't complaining that there is mystery. We're complaining that Paizo acts like it has The Answer, when in truth, they don't. If they don't want to clarify their canon, that's fine, but they don't get to have their cake and eat it too.
Which makes it an enormous pain in the ass to make a character for if you've never played in it. Answering a simple question like "Where am I from?" is like pulling teeth in that setting.
Great setting, loving Age of Worms, but more information easily available would be great.
So pull your GM's teeth! If you're having trouble making a character for Greyhawk, your GM should be answering your questions. That's one of their jobs.
And thats the part I think they misshandled. You have an answer to a mystery your never going to reveal thats fine but dont tell everyone you have the answer and are never going to tell them it.James Jacobs has openly stated that Paizo "knows" the "true" answer, but will never share it, and that it's not guessable.
Precisely my point. Every setting needs unsolved mysteries. Bombadil and the entwives. The true nature of the Dark Powers. The Day of Mourning and the Draconic Prophecy, the true virtue of the Silver Flame, and whether or not the gods of Eberron are real. Why Roque Ja let Thorn and Bone go. Why we give a s~!! about any quests when Elminster could just fix everything because he's so great and perfect and badass omg Elminster plz answer my calls. Mysteries are a crucial part of fantasy, and Paizo is fully entitled to its own. The trouble is, they don't seem to get the point of one.
You don't remember a time before 9/11? And you're an active gamer shaping this forum? I feel soooooo old.I also don't remember a time before Toy Story.
So wait, you didn't get to drop acid, go see Toy Story in the theater then spend the rest of the night hiding in your friend's closet waiting for his old G.I. Joe figures to come to life.
Man, you missed out. :-)
Please don't pull my teeth. I'm not an expert on Greyhawk, either, and now their wiki's down. :(
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
I think you misunderstood both me and Kevin Mack, Bill Dunn. We're fine with unclarified mysteries. The problem is that Paizo is determined to have the One True Answer. It's actually not that big a problem, but it indicates a fundamental failure to understand what makes a great uncertainty.
We aren't complaining that there is mystery. We're complaining that Paizo acts like it has The Answer, when in truth, they don't. If they don't want to clarify their canon, that's fine, but they don't get to have their cake and eat it too.
Why do you think they don't have an answer? Basically, it's my understanding they've got one based on the original setting's conception and effectively redacted it for publication. That's a call for the GM to explore the idea and fill in the answer themselves, should they choose to do so.